An amateur coach's musings on the game they play in Heaven

Slow Ball v Organised Defence?

In the last couple of articles I talked about how to get your defence organised. I extended the discussion from technique to tactics, stressing that having more defenders on the front foot, ready and focused is how a team starts shutting down the attack and winning the ball back. If a defending team is still trying to get set – not even looking up yet to see what’s in front of them in terms of threats – all the initiative is with the attacking team. So what does one do when faced with a team that’s not committed to the ruck, is standing on the front foot in greater numbers and ready to pounce? As described in my analysis of the Biarritz v Ulster screen shots, simply starting a wide attack comes with much risk as chances are that your first or second receiver could get caught well behind the gain line and the support committed to the last ruck will have to retreat significantly to help out.

If you’ve got flashy backs with good handling and speed and they’ve shown not to be the best of tacklers somewhere in the backs, it might be worth a shot. But a safer option is to organise a few forwards to re-start this ‘slow ball’ situation with a powerful drive into the defensive line. The tactic in question is often referred to as a Pick and Go or Pick and Drive, both of which involve a player playing the ball from the base of the ruck, never leaving a low body position, and driving into a gap into the defensive wall with at least one team mate assisting the drive. This is an especially good tactic close to the goal line as it is hard for a solitary defender to resist the power of two attackers with a low centre of gravity driving in unison on one spot. Note the Chiefs doing this expertly in this clip:

This is also an effective means by which to assist a player who’s not gone into contact looking for an offload and especially if his / her body position isn’t going to allow them a solid go-forward drive, as in this series of photos:

The ball carrier has gone into contact a bit high and side ways. She has two defenders to face who should dominate the ensuing tackle contest.

The first support player has 'hammered' onto both the ball and the body to secure possession and maintain a forward drive. The second player has 'latched' on to the first and is helping the forward drive.

Forward momentum dominance brings them to ground even before the referee declares it to be a classic 'maul', and a solid seal is created over the ruck by the two supporting players as they continue to drive over the ball carrier.

In the first photo, without support, the ball carrier was likely to have been caught behind the gain line with defenders in a dominant position over top of her, ready to steal the ball. With support ‘hammering’ and ‘latching’ to both secure the ball and maintain a forward, drive possession was not only maintained, but they gained quite a few metres in the process. If you look at the third photo, you can see that a few defenders have had to retreat so quickly that they’ve opted to turn around. None are on the forward foot ready to go. A quick ball to the left from this ruck would catch them disorganised and on the back foot – a great attacking platform.

From a relatively advantageous position, the defence is now faced with having to get back on side, reorganise, and scan for threats. Again, if the ball is already OUT before this is done, then the defence will under more pressure and the attacking team has regained the initiative. I’ve heard some criticise this tactic as teams often gain little ground, and some even get caught behind the previous gain line! I’d argue, however, that the point here is not to gain ground, but to disrupt and manipulate the defence so that the next phase can be run against un-ready and disorganised defenders. In the above case, just three players were involved in this, leaving 12 to be part of the next phase.

Where I see fault in pick and drives as a tactic is when teams use too many in a row – and sometimes that can just mean two! If momentum is there and defenders are not, then there’s a strong chance for that coveted line break which will turn the entire defence. In most cases, though, teams are drilled to protect that area (as discussed in the Defensive Organisation article) at all costs, and so numbers will converge on that spot – opening definite opportunities elsewhere. With my teams, usually two good pick and drives is enough to cause utter disarray in the defensive line and give us some opportunities out wide.

In the following clip, the Welsh have organised themselves quite well at the tackle contest and are on the front foot. Instead of playing too wide, the hooker steps in to pass to a pod of players standing just outside of the A-B ruck defenders (a weaker, and more useful spot to hit it up at this level). Quick possession is secured and moved to another forward just as the Welsh are setting up and the All Blacks elect to try the short side, again quickly, which not only causes the Welsh to retreat even further, but opens width for more than 2/3rds of the All Blacks to go on the fourth phase.

This sort of planned and determined structure is a simple way to achieve the ultimate goal of disrupting and manipulating the defence so that subsequent attacks can be launched against an un-ready and disorganised defence.